How to Set Up Your Phone for International Travel

By
Jill Duffy14 Mar 2017, 5:11 a.m.

Unless you prepare in advance, using your smartphone abroad can be a nightmare. These tips can help smooth the way.

You're getting ready to travel abroad, and you've put off figuring out how you'll have phone service while you're gone. What to do and how to do it? There are four questions you need to answer before making a decision about your phone use abroad:

Does your carrier offer service, usually through a partner, in the region where you're traveling?

How much does a local SIM card cost?

If you don't know the answer to the first three questions, the easiest way to find out is to call your phone carrier or stop by a store.

If you'd rather do some homework, let me warn you that figuring out the answer to the first question in particular is a royal pain in the ass if you actually want to understand the technical details behind it. All you really need to know is that there are two standards in mobile phone service: GSM and CDMA (you could learn what makes them different, if you're so inclined).

GSM is used pretty much all over the world. CDMA is thankfully falling out of fashion pretty quickly, so if your phone is fairly new, you don't have to worry. But if you do have a CDMA-only phone, it's going to cause problems when you travel. CDMA is really only used in the US for Sprint, Verizon, and U.S. Cellular phones (AT&T and T-Mobile use GSM). If your phone uses GSM, or both GSM and CDMA, you're probably fine. If your phone is CDMA-only, it may not work outside the US, and you should look into using a different phone. There are a few options, and I'll get to those in a moment.

As far as whether your phone is unlocked or can be unlocked, that usually comes down to asking your carrier. If you are on a contract, there's a good chance your phone is locked. There are other reasons a phone might be locked, too. Sometimes you can unlock a phone by yourself by going to your carrier's website and following some instructions, but you'll save yourself heaps of time if you can drop by a store or call the support team and let them handle it for you.

Does your carrier offer service where you're going? Again, ask a representative at your carrier's store, on the customer support phone line, or try searching the carrier's site. A secondary question to this, is will the service be any good where you're traveling? Different phones and different mobile service providers use different frequencies. In some countries, a foreign phone will get very slow data, like 2G or 3G only. Trying to figure it out yourself is a crapshoot depending on a number of factors.

All these questions are really designed to help you figure out your options. So let's get to the options.

1. Bring Your Phone, Pay for Roaming

A low-hassle but high-fee solution is to bring your phone and pay for roaming charges. This solution is great for very short trips. This option is generally only workable if you answered yes to the first three questions above. I still recommend calling your carrier before you go to make sure roaming will work.

2. Bring Your Phone, Pay for a Package

If you answered yes to the first three questions, another option is to bring your phone and buy some kind of international data package. Carriers have all kinds of plans. AT&T currently has a $10 per day option that only charges you for days on which you use it. The $10-a-day plan is a great option if you're traveling to a place where you may not need phone service at all, but you're not sure. You don't have to use it, but it's there if you need it.

3. Bring Your Phone, Use a New SIM Card

Phone service is extraordinarily cheap in some countries, so take advantage of those prices by purchasing a local SIM card when you arrive. A SIM card is nothing more than a little chip that goes inside your phone. It's what lets your phone make calls and use the internet. For this option to work, make sure you answered yes to the first two questions above.

In some countries (many in Southeast Asia, for example), you can spend $10 to $20 for a beefy amount of data, calls, and SMS texts. In places where this option is popular, you typically see kiosks at the airport that sell SIM cards, and the clerks there can install one for you. Take advantage of that service so you can make sure your phone stays in a language that you can actually read, and to make sure it's working before you leave. You can also buy a SIM at a local phone store. Usually, the SIM card plans come with an option to top up the balance in case you use all the data before your trip ends. Prices and availability vary, so check travel forums of your destination for up-to-date advice.

Another type of SIM card you can buy is one with an international roaming plan, such as those offered by KnowRoaming. You can buy these ahead of time, before you leave your home country. They're typically better for frequent travelers than someone taking a short vacation once a year.

4. Bring an Old Phone or Rent One

Let's say you're interested in using a local SIM card, but your phone isn't unlocked. Or maybe you're going somewhere a little rough and tumble, and you don't want to be waving around a $600 phone. You can bring an old phone, say, one that's been sitting in a drawer for the last year. Renting a phone at the same type of store that sells SIM cards is another option. Again, prices and availability will vary.

5. Look for Hotels That Loan Smartphones

I went to Hong Kong last year, and the hotel where I stayed loaned every guest a "handy" (as smartphones are known there) with data and calls included. What a great perk! A few hotels in Singapore do it, too. Wherever you're headed, make sure you know the local term for smartphone so you can search whether this trend is catching on there. If it is, take advantage of it for local calls, navigating the city, looking up local business information, and using car service apps. Be sure to only use your own device for taking photos and for more sensitive data, such as email.

6. Bring Your Phone, Use It Only on Wi-Fi

You might be amazed at how wired and well connected some places are. I got around both Dubai and Ho Chi Minh City recently by relying entirely on the abundant free Wi-Fi and in Vietnam, offline Google maps (offline Google maps aren't supported in the UAE). Messaging apps work over Wi-Fi, too (unless they are blocked by the country you're traveling to), so you won't have much trouble keeping in touch with friends and family back home. Additionally, all four major US phone companies now support Wi-Fi calling, so as long as Wi-Fi calling itself is not blocked by the host country, you may be able to make calls from your own phone number very easily, too. Sometimes Wi-Fi calling does incur additional charges, depending on where you are in the world and where you're calling, so check with your carrier.

7. Stay Safe With a VPN

Add a VPN service to your mobile devices. It's actually a good idea whenever you use public Wi-Fi, in the US or abroad. VPNs, or virtual private networks, essentially give you one more layer of online protection. Abroad, they can make it seem as if your internet traffic is coming from within the US, which is helpful if you need to do emergency banking or some other online activity that might kick off users who aren't in their home countries. My colleague Max Eddy has tested the best VPNs for Android, and his article includes a brief description about how they work, too.

8. It's All About the Apps

Use a messaging app to stay in touch. SMS text is fine for staying in touch when everyone is in the same country or on the same mobile network. But a messaging app is much cheaper and more convenient for chatting among people who are in different countries. WhatsApp is a long-time favorite, but Signal has gotten a lot of attention lately for its strong security and encryption. Another good option, especially because so many people have accounts, is Facebook Messenger.

9. Bring Your Own Adapter

Bring an adapter. USB charging stations are common in airports and hotels. If you're careful with your privacy, you won't use these for phones and tablets. Why not? Because they can be modified to steal data from your device. It was a known problem for both Android and iOS devices a few years ago, and while phone makers have addressed the issue by requiring the phone owner to give permission to a new device before it accesses your data, it's still better to be safe than sorry. Be sure to also pick up a universal adapter or one that's specific to where you're traveling. And don't worry that the US is on 110 volts while much of the rest of the world is on 220 or higher. Computing equipment is all built to handle it. You might even be impressed with how much faster your phone charges. Just don't plug in a curling iron.

Before joining PCMag.com, she was senior editor at the Association for Computing Machinery, a non-profit membership organization for computer scientists and students. She also spent five years as a writer and managing editor of Game Developer magazine, ... See Full Bio